Colorblind
by Lady Dementia
Summary: Grief makes them interchangeable, but there's only one brother left to mourn.


_Disclaimer: I don't own Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I make no profit, and so on and so forth. _

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**Colorblind**  
By Lady Dementia

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Rain hovered at the edge of falling, ready to drain the evening sky of sunset color and bring down the night. Darkness hemmed the horizon, and his vision blurred. Tears had left paths from running freely down his face, but his eyes were dry. They stared at the clouds without seeing, the mind behind them blinded by personal tragedy. 

It seemed totally inappropriate that no sound broke the twilight hour. Tragedy wasn't meant to be silent. Tragedy should be confronted by violent storms of grief and rage, not approached quietly by a rain shower. That made it seem natural, and it shouldn't be. This brother, of all of the four, should defy the silence with everything he had, everything he had been, everything left in him. Instead, he sat motionless and silent. Internally, he screamed. His mind rioted in memory and agony of thought that came too late for action. There should have been action, the burn of muscle in defiance as he fought, but there wasn't. The battle couldn't be fought by fists and feet. It had been lost before he'd known it had begun, and defeat overwhelmed him, a heavy weight on each limb that subdued even his will. He couldn't move even if he wanted to. He couldn't stand against it. He couldn't do anything but sit here and struggle with his sorrow.

If the world was fair, there wouldn't have been a last brother. No one was supposed to be alone.

But he had long ago realized that the world was not fair. If it had been, they would have all died at once. The pain of a wound he could stand, but the pain of loss never fully healed. A fair world would have never left him so crippled.

When his first brother died in violence, the death had blindsided him like a knife flaying open his heart. No one can prepare for death, but they had all pictured their deaths as a blaze of glory for unsung heroes. That had been what they expected, even accepted. They hadn't expected a drunk man driving a truck on an ice-coated street. They hadn't expected the piercing screams, the bloody, broken body, the sheer panic and fear lingering through days and nights when one brother's wet, gurgling breath became their world. His slow death left them stunned and shamed, unexpectedly relieved by the end when it finally came and wracked by guilt for that.

Guilt festered like a deep wound that healed only on the surface. Like an infection, it poisoned their minds and drove them apart. Mourning became an excuse to abandon each other. That was when their enemies chose to strike.

His second brother died of that attack, sacrificing himself in a blaze of glory and violence that they had always imagined—but two brothers survived that blaze. His death cauterized their wounded hearts, purging with courage and words the shame they had carried inside. He had saved and shattered them in one stroke, but the cleansing had been what he had wanted. They had been taught to live and die honorably, protecting others and choosing their own fate. The grief that followed had at last been clean. Two brothers had stood together where three had been apart, and they mourned.

Now one brother would stand alone where two had leaned on each other, a remnant of a family but a family nonetheless. There had been none one to protect, and nothing to choose. There had been no one to fight, no enemy but the body itself. As unexpected as a truck and as final as a sword, a spasm of pain shocked the body and killed it. A heart faltered, stuttered…stopped. They were mutant turtles, but they were human enough for heart failure.

One brother remained, where two had stood together. One more brother to bury, and no one left to share the burden of grief. Why him, of all of them? Why had death stolen the breath from one set of lungs and not the other? What pitiless foe took only one?

He sat, staring out at the lightening flickering on thunderheads, and soundlessly railed against the coming darkness for what it had taken from him. Death wasn't supposed to come quietly, taking life away into the night without at least the chance to fight or at least say goodbye. It wasn't right, it wasn't fair, and it was too late.

The rain would soon fall, as inevitable as the night closing in around him. Darkness followed the silver streaks of water down. Somewhere, out there beyond the falling sky, his brothers waited. He couldn't help but be glad for that. He'd go to them soon enough, but this time between was bittersweet. One brother should not stand where four should be. Brothers weren't meant to be alone, especially not this one.

The tear tracks slowly dried on his face in the cool breeze rushing before the rain. No more would slip from his eyes. It wasn't supposed to end in silence, but end it had. Night descended as the clouds broke open above him, and a hand touched his shoulder, asking if he was alright.

He fell from his seat, leaving his brother standing alone.

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**End**

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_Author's Note: Thanks to the appropriate people, who looked the original version of this and went "Buh?" The point of the title for this fic is that I wrote it to be generic; there is no brother named for each death, and I think that any bandana could be applied. In case it's not clear, one brother suffered a heart attack while sitting there watching the sky, and this fic is his thoughts between life and death for his dead brothers and last living brother._

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